March 14 (Bloomberg) -- Two Swiss men who acted as “full
service tax evasion advisers” helped U.S. clients hide hundreds
of millions of dollars from tax authorities, while delivering
cash in hotels and through a child courier, prosecutors said.

Hans Thomann and Josef Beck, who worked as independent
financial advisers, conspired to help Americans defraud the
Internal Revenue Service and ran unlicensed businesses that
moved cash for clients, according to charges filed yesterday in
federal court in Manhattan.

Thomann helped clients hide $138 million in assets from the
IRS and Beck helped conceal $129 million, according to
indictments unsealed today. Working separately, they helped
clients move cash, using street corners and hotel rooms to evade
detection, prosecutors said today in a statement. Beck even used
a child “to make a drop,” prosecutors said.

Prosecutors said the men worked with Wegelin & Co., the
270-year-old private bank, which last month became the first
Swiss lender indicted in the U.S. The Justice Department has
charged at least 23 foreign bankers, advisers and attorneys, and
at least 40 U.S. taxpayers in a crackdown on offshore tax
evasion since 2008.

“Hans Thomann and Josef Beck acted as full service tax
evasion advisers to their American clients,” Manhattan U.S.
Attorney Preet Bharara said in the statement. Beyond aiding
clients in hiding income overseas, they “helped their clients
moves hundreds of thousands of dollars across the Atlantic
without a trace.”

Manhattan Hotels

Both Thomann, 61, and Beck, 46, met clients in Manhattan
hotels to hand them cash they couldn’t withdraw without visiting
Switzerland and pick up money to deposit in their undeclared
accounts, according to the indictments.

Beck, who ran the asset-management firm Beck Verwaltungen
AG, also gave addresses to his clients in the U.S. and Israel
where they could pick up or drop off cash, and sometimes they
gave cash to one another, prosecutors said.

A person identified as “Client 2” faxed Beck a letter to
withdraw $150,000 in 2009 from Wegelin, according to the
indictment. An “unknown person” told him to go to an address
in Brooklyn, New York, at a particular time, the indictment
said.

‘Small Child’

Upon Client 2’s arrival, “a small child of approximately
five years of age exited from the home located at the specified
address, walked up to Client 2’s car, and handed Client 2 a
brown paper bag containing approximately $150,000 in cash,”
according to the indictment.

Later that year, Client 2 told Beck by fax that he wanted
another $180,000 in cash from Wegelin, the indictment said. Two
weeks later, another unknown caller directed him to a Brooklyn
address, where a man of age 40 to 45 walked up to his car and
gave him a bag with $180,000 in cash, according to the
indictment.

An unidentified man also made four cash deliveries of about
$100,000 each to the home in Queens, New York, of Client 4,
according to the indictment.

Thomann was a banker at UBS AG, Switzerland’s biggest bank,
from 1993 until 2003, according to his indictment.

UBS Charges

U.S. prosecutors charged Zurich-based UBS in 2009 with
helping Americans hide assets from the IRS. UBS avoided
prosecution by admitting it aided tax evasion, paying
$780 million and handing over data on 250 accounts. It later
disclosed another 4,450 accounts, causing U.S. customers to seek
new banks.

Thomann helped 33 former UBS clients transfer their
accounts to other banks, including Wegelin and several
unidentified institutions, according to his indictment. They
were referred to as “a Swiss bank,” “the Swiss branch of an
Israeli bank,” “a Swiss cantonal bank” and “Swiss-Liechtenstein Bank No. 1.”

The Thomann indictment also details how he helped clients
deposit and withdraw cash without him having to carry money into
the U.S. A New Jersey client typically gave him between $60,000
and $80,000, and once gave him $140,000, according to the
indictment.

In helping clients keep their offshore accounts secret,
Thomann worked with a Swiss financial adviser already under
indictment, Beda Singenberger, and a Swiss lawyer charged in the
U.S., Matthias Rickenbach, according to the indictment.

‘International Bank’

Beck also helped UBS clients open undeclared accounts at
other banks, including Wegelin, an “international bank,” and
two Swiss banks, according to the indictment.

Thomann and Beck face as many as 10 years in prison. They
are among at least 21 bankers, advisers or lawyers outside the
U.S. who were charged in American courts. None have appeared.

Credit Suisse Group AG, the second-largest Swiss bank, said
July 15 that it was a target of a criminal probe by the Justice
Department over former cross-border private-banking services to
U.S. customers. On July 21, seven current and former Credit
Suisse bankers were indicted on a charge of conspiring to help
U.S. clients evade taxes through secret accounts.

The IRS has said 30,000 U.S. taxpayers with offshore
accounts have avoided prosecution since 2009 by entering a
limited amnesty program, paying back taxes and saying who helped
them hide their accounts from authorities. Hundreds of taxpayers
in the program have given prosecutors information that has
helped them build criminal cases against bankers and advisers.

“We continue to obtain access to more and more information
on individuals and institutions who are involved in hiding
offshore assets,” Victor W. Lessoff, acting special agent in
charge of the IRS New York field office, said in a statement.

The cases are U.S. v. Thomann, 12-cr-00212, and U.S. v.
Beck, 12-cr-00211, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New
York (Manhattan).